


Healing is a Verb like Trust

by notfromcold



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Blood and Injury, Gen, Graphic Description, Hurt/Comfort, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani is an Incurable Romantic, M/M, Medical, Nile Freeman Needs a Hug, Soft Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani, Soft Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Whump, soft nile freeman, soft quynh
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-11-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:15:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27664580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notfromcold/pseuds/notfromcold
Summary: Nile realizes that she wants to spend the rest of her life helping people. And that's going to be a good long time.Ch 1: Nile and Nicky as team medics; Joe has a tough day but is uncomplaining.Ch 2: Interlude - in which tea is consumed.Ch 3: Nile and Joe as team medics; Andy is a tiny bit of a disaster.Ch 4: Nile and Quynh witness devastation and injustice and joy.Ch 5: The team goes to Pride.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 10
Kudos: 34





	1. A Verb like Trust

**Author's Note:**

> CW: blood, injury, and slightly graphic field medicine for immortals in Ch. 1 (sorry, Joe). Less graphic injury in Ch. 2. Prison industrial complex in Ch. 3. Ch. 4 is just PRIDE :-)

"Nile, you're with Nicky," Andy had told her. And Nicky had smiled at her happily. He was sitting bent over his medic bag on one of the rickety camp beds, looking a bit like a cormorant on a rock as he checked his gear. Nile walked across the room to peer over his shoulder.

"Why does an immortal team need two medics?" Nile asked.

Nicky looked up at her. "Well, it doesn't actually need two medics." His lips quirked up at the edges. "But I'm glad to work with you and Andy thought you should learn. Plus another set of hands is helpful. So thank you for that. It makes my day easier."

"Sure," Nile tried again, "Thanks for showing me the ropes. But why does an immortal team need one medic, then? It's not like we can be permanently hurt."

"Injuries still hurt or need temporary fixes. Plus," Nicky sliced a hand through the air in a gesture Nile had noticed he shared with Joe, "sometimes wounds heal too quickly. Wounds heal with bullets or shrapnel still inside. And that has to be sorted out."

Sorted out. Right. Nile squared her shoulders and took a breath.

"Right. Okay. Always practical. So what have you got in your bag?"

She hoped there wouldn't be anything to sort out today, even while knowing that - today or not - eventually there would be.

\---

"Don't worry, Nile." Joe's face was pale and sweat was beading at his hairline. "I'm in good hands." He winked. "I mean yours, of course."

Nile smiled at him and shook her head, focused on holding the light for Nicky and on paying attention in case she was asked to do anything.

Joe returned her smile encouragingly but then Nicky said "Brace" and started his search for the bullet in Joe's arm and Joe refocused on breathing.

"Got it," Nicky announced after thirty seconds of looking that felt more like thirty minutes. "Nile, could you flush this out please."

Nile tried to be gentle but Joe still flinched a little. "You're okay," she told him, wondering when she became a person who told badly injured people they were fine.

Joe looked up at the sound of her voice, eyes wide and wet, expressive face lined with exhausted patience.

"We're done," Nicky said, his movements decisive as he took his hands from Joe's arm, telegraphing finality with sudden lack of touch. 

Joe shook himself, wincing as the wound closed before their eyes, and took a slow, deep breath.

"Do you need a moment?" Nicky asked carefully, as careful as he'd been when he'd removed the bullet.

"No." Joe reached for Nicky's hands, removing one bloody glove and then the other. He took Nicky's clean fingers in his and pressed a kiss to the knuckles. "These hands could never harm me."

Nile found it best not to mention that those hands had, by Joe's own admission, killed him in centuries past.

She felt a little proud as the team jogged to the car and away from the newly burning building (subtlety, thy name was not Andy).

Nile called shotgun and when she looked back, Joe was leaning against Nicky as Nicky stroked a hand over his hair. Joe yawned like a tired child, his eyelids fluttering, then gave her a slow smile. "Thank you for your help, habibti." 

Nile smiled back. "Of course, Joe. How are you feeling?"

"Good as new."


	2. Interlude - In which tea is consumed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is tea.

Back at the safehouse, Joe made her tea.

Nicky had checked in with her, had watched her carefully as they put away their gear, had suggested she rest.

But Joe seemed to have something to ask.

"So?" he asked her. The kettle screeched a discordant note. There appeared to be something wrong with whatever mechanism was supposed to whistle.

"Sit," she told him. "I'll pour." She pushed herself to her aching feet and moved to the beat up stove, picking the kettle up with one hand and pouring boiling water over the chamomile tea bags in their chipped mugs. Her eyes roamed over the kitchen knickknacks: a ceramic frog, a ceramic cat, a dusty whiteboard with nothing on it leaning against the fridge. She gestured to the frog and the cat. "Who likes ceramics?"

"Andy." Joe gave her a lopsided smile. "She likes thrifting." Then, "So?" he asked again as Nile sat down, mugs in hand. "How are you feeling about today?"

"I liked helping you," Nile answered slowly, thinking through her words. "And it was interesting."

"An intellectual challenge. You're good at it. Does that bother you?"

Nile raised her eyebrows. "No. Should it?"

"It absolutely should not. But it might bother some people. You have a rare gift for mixing objectivity and compassion." Yusuf smiled. "The Marine Corps didn't know what they had."

They hadn't known what they'd had, Nile thought. Not with her and not with Dizzy or Jay. Even before her first death she'd been feeling that intensely. And she'd been praying, even, for some way to do different, help more, help for real.

This wasn't what she'd had in mind. But sometimes when God closes a door, you yeet yourself out the window of a skyscraper with a pharmaceutical exec.

"I'd wanted to be an artist," Nile told Yusuf.

"Me too," he replied.

"Is this what you do? Not going in guns blazing all the time but helping a child, supporting a community, not -" Occupying, her mind supplied.

Yusuf seemed to know where her thoughts had landed. "I told you it depends on the century. But lately I think we're doing okay. You are good at this."

"Do you still have time to do art?" Nile hated that her voice felt small when she asked. She hated that she cared so much about the answer. She hated that her ruined plans of art school were still an open aching wound.

"Time is one thing we have a lot of," Yusuf said very gently. "Would you like to see some sketches?"


End file.
